Claimed

  This time she tackled the facility’s pantry, pulling canned food and boxes of freeze-dried packets off the shelves and shoving them into the duffels. From the corner of her eye she saw Rylan march by with a drum of oil in his hands, which she realized was probably a critical acquisition for the men.

  There weren’t many operational refineries left on the globe; the few that existed were in East Colony, but West Colony did have its own pipeline, along with a solitary oil rig up north, in an area her father had told her was once called Alberta. Petroleum products were hard to come by outside the city, so she understood the relief on Rylan’s face as he trudged past her.

  She dropped off her second load of supplies with Kade, then made a third trek inside. She was halfway to the pantry when a sharp voice called out to her.

  “Hudson.”

  Gulping, she turned to find Connor in the corridor.

  “Come here a minute.” Without awaiting a response, he stalked toward the double doors at the end of the hall. They were marked COMMAND ROOM.

  Crap.

  Her knees wobbled as she followed him. She was terrified that she was about to come face-to-face with the second Enforcer, that he might be someone she knew from the compound, someone who would take one look at her and —

  Two dead bodies were sprawled on the cement floor when she entered the room.

  The relief was instantaneous, trailed rapidly by a jolt of guilt for being relieved that the men were dead. She didn’t recognize either one of them, but the neat bullet holes in the center of their foreheads made her heart ache.

  She turned to Connor. “Why did you kill them?” She couldn’t control the note of wary accusation in her tone.

  On the other side of the room, Pike raised his head from the papers he’d been shuffling through. “Because we’re not stupid,” he answered for Connor. “We don’t leave loose ends, especially the kind that pose a threat to us.”

  “You could’ve tied them up, or knocked them out, or…” She drifted off unhappily. “They didn’t have to be a threat.”

  “Everyone is a threat,” Pike corrected, then dismissed her with a hard look and continued to rummage through the desk.

  Connor didn’t contradict his friend’s statement. Nor did he seem at all concerned about the two dead Enforcers at his feet. He pointed to a large cabinet against one of the cinder-block walls and asked, “Do you know how to use any of this shit? Xan’s our tech junkie and he already took what he needed, but if there’s anything you might want, grab it now.”

  She wandered over to the cabinet, but almost everything inside it was way too advanced for her. Technology continued to thrive in West City, evolving faster than even she could keep up with. She rifled through the shelves and was surprised when she came across a stack of computing tablets that she did have experience with.

  “Do you guys have a way to get online?” she asked over her shoulder.

  Connor nodded.

  She held up one of the tablets. “Then I might be able to use these.”

  “Take ’em all, then.”

  She tucked the devices into the duffel, then left the command room. A little too eagerly, probably, but she didn’t care. She wanted to get out of this facility as quickly as possible.

  Rylan came up beside her as she loaded the duffel into the back of the Jeep. “So. Your intel paid off,” he remarked, sounding grudgingly impressed. Then he grinned. “You’re more than just a pretty face, aren’t you, gorgeous?”

  “Damn straight.” A little burst of joy went off inside her. She’d proved herself useful to them. Now she just had to keep doing that, and maybe they’d actually let her stay.

  The more time she spent outside the city, the more she realized that she couldn’t survive alone. She’d thought her self-defense skills and medical knowledge would be enough for her to make a life for herself out here, but she’d been wrong. Survival hinged on finding supplies, on finding a camp, on finding other people to watch your back.

  She clung to the reminder as they left the storage station less than an hour after raiding it. She had to prove to Connor that she could be a good addition to his group, but that conversation would have to wait until later. It was impossible to talk when they were speeding through the dark landscape on Connor’s motorcycle.

  She settled in for the long ride back to camp only to blink in surprise when Connor pulled off the main road less than thirty minutes later.

  Her heart lodged in her throat as the road became bumpier, more and more overgrown. Eventually a faint light became visible through the dense trees, and the road smoothed out, gravel crunching beneath their tires as they followed a winding driveway deeper into the trees.

  A few minutes later Connor slowed the motorcycle, and Hudson caught sight of a split-level house in the distance. All the windows were curtained, but light and shadow moved behind the thick drapes.

  “What is this place?” she demanded.

  Connor killed the engine and dropped the kickstand. “A house.”

  “Yeah, I got that,” Hudson snapped. “Where are we?”

  Panic flooded her belly when he didn’t answer. Was he planning to leave her here?

  He chuckled at her expression. “There’s nothing to be scared of, sweetheart.”

  She swallowed. “No?”

  “No.” He smiled, his straight white teeth gleaming in the darkness. “This is what we always do after a run. We unwind.”

  “Unwind?” Her throat went impossibly dry.

  “You’re an outlaw, right? You know the kind of things we do to relax.” His voice lowered. It was husky, raw. “The world is so fucking bleak. So much pain everywhere you look. That’s why we take pleasure anywhere we can get it. It’s our way… Isn’t it, Hudson?”

  Our way.

  Shit. He was testing her again. He still didn’t believe her story, and now he was going to… to what?

  What on earth was she going to find inside that house?

  5

  Candles illuminated the front hallway. The pale yellow glow cast shadows on the dark paneled walls and danced over the hardwood floor beneath Hudson’s feet. The scent of wax and incense wafted all around her. And the sounds…

  Sex.

  The house pulsed with sex.

  Husky noises and soft moans echoed from the back rooms, from the corridor to Hudson’s left, from the arched doorway off the entrance. It was everywhere, thickening the air and heating her skin, prompting her to look at Connor in suspicion.

  Rylan and the others trudged ahead of her, ducking through the heavy oak doors that led to a room Hudson wasn’t sure she wanted to enter. She grabbed ahold of Connor’s sleeve before he could follow them.

  “You brought me to a whorehouse?” she hissed.

  He furrowed his brow. “There are whorehouses like this all over the free land. You can’t tell me this is your first time visiting one.”

  “My group never got around to it,” she answered in a tight voice.

  She didn’t like that he hadn’t corrected her about the purpose of the house. If anything, his cavalier tone triggered a spurt of resentment. She didn’t want to be here. It reminded her too much of the Enforcer compound, where the men passed women around like pieces of gum. It didn’t matter that the women had volunteered to be there. They were still treated like sex slaves and viewed as whores, and it nauseated Hudson to think that the task of pleasuring the Enforcers was deemed an honor.

  Everyone was considered equal in the city. People got paid the same amount for hauling garbage as they did for working in the technology sector. They lived in allocated accommodations, all identical in size. They ate at assigned meal halls and were served food that met their nutritional requirements. Hudson’s father had explained that the practice had once been referred to as communism, the idea of common ownership and the absence of social classes.

  But every system had a loophole, and the Enforcers had no problem taking advantage of it. The city’s women earned monetary bonuses for
offering their bodies to the men. Some were even given annual vacations to South Colony. Keep the Enforcers happy, and you were excused from the job rotation to lie on a beach for a week. High-class prostitution at its best.

  Hudson frowned at Connor. “You talk about the free land, but you still call this place a whorehouse. Is that how you view women? As whores?”

  A slow grin lifted his mouth, as if he were genuinely amused by her accusation. “We’re all whores here, sweetheart. Every single one of us.”

  He uncurled her fingers from his arm but didn’t let go of her. Instead, he kept a tight grip on her hand and led her deeper into the house. They passed several closed doors, and Hudson’s pulse sped up, because it was painfully obvious what was going on behind those doors. Groans of pleasure. The rhythmic smacking of a headboard hitting the wall. A cry of ecstasy as a woman climaxed.

  Hudson drew a breath as they neared the set of doors that Rylan and the others had disappeared through. She tried to steel herself, but nothing prepared her for what she found when they entered the room.

  The surprisingly large space offered an array of couches and armchairs, and there was a long bar counter spanning one wall. About two dozen people lingered in the room. Men and women, some fully clothed, some naked. Low voices engaged in conversation mingled with the throaty sounds of sex. In a shadowy corner of the room, a brunette was bent over, facing the wall, as a bare-assed man thrust into her from behind, his hands gripping her waist, his lips pressed against her shoulder.

  Hudson wrenched her gaze away from the lewd display, but it just landed on another one – a tangle of naked limbs on a plush couch, a woman’s fingernails scraping down the back of the man on top of her.

  Did these people have no shame?

  Her cheeks were on fire as she sought out a safe place for her eyes. Connor. Connor was safe. Connor wasn’t naked.

  And maybe she was as shameful as everyone else here, because the fact that he was still dressed brought genuine disappointment to her belly.

  A dark-haired man sauntered up to them. Tall and handsome, with magnetic gray eyes that lingered on Hudson before shifting to Connor. “Well, if it isn’t Connor MacKenzie. Long time, man.”

  “Lennox.” Connor slapped the man on the shoulder. “How’s it going?”

  “All right.” The man shrugged. “We’ve been hearing about a lot of the Enforcer stations being repurposed. Some are closing down altogether.”

  “Security is changing too,” Connor admitted. “We just hit a storage facility that was outfitted with land mines.”

  Lennox frowned. “Well, that’s no good.”

  “Make sure you let your people know. They’ll need to change their tactics before they go on any more runs.”

  “Will do. Thanks for the heads-up.” The man’s gaze traveled back to Hudson, a smirk playing on his lips. “I see you brought some party favors tonight, Con.”

  Hudson’s shoulders tensed. Was that it? Had Connor brought her here to… to be a party favor for his outlaw friends?

  But he quickly squashed that thought by muttering, “She’s not here for that.”

  “Pity.” Lennox smiled at Hudson, and she found herself relaxing at the seductive curve of his lips. “Come find me if you change your mind, love.”

  As he wandered off, Hudson glanced at Connor apprehensively. “Does he own this place?”

  Connor nodded. “Come on. I need a drink,” he said, rounding the bar.

  Apparently this was a serve-yourself kind of establishment.

  She worked up the courage to take another look around and noticed that Rylan had already made himself comfortable. He was sprawled on one of the couches with a tumbler in his hand and a beautiful woman in his lap. Skintight denim encased the woman’s legs, and her blond hair fell like a curtain over one shoulder, stopping right below her breasts. Her very bare breasts.

  Rylan caught Hudson’s eye and winked. Then his hand moved in a slow caress down the blonde’s arm before curling to cup one firm breast.

  Heat tingled in Hudson’s nipples, almost as if Rylan had touched her. She squeezed her thighs together and pulled her gaze away.

  “What’s your poison?” Connor asked gruffly.

  She stared at the top-notch alcohol lining the bar top, wondering what kind of payment Lennox demanded from his patrons for drinking his booze. Her heartbeat accelerated as a panicky notion came to mind. No. Nobody was going to lay a hand on her, damn it.

  Her gaze landed on Connor’s strong hands as he rifled through bottles, and her breasts tingled harder, making her amend that last thought. Nobody was laying a hand on her unless she wanted them to.

  She unwittingly glanced in Rylan’s direction again, her breath hitching when she saw his tongue dart out to taste his companion’s nipple.

  “Tequila,” she choked out, her throat drier than dust.

  “Look at those wide eyes,” Connor mocked. “Makes me think you’ve never seen people fucking before.”

  “No, I…” She swallowed. “I have. I saw lots of things at… the camp.”

  He poured two tumblers and walked back to her, leading her to a vinyl stool. “Relax, sweetheart.” He forced her to sit, then planted the glass in her hand, the mocking note never leaving his voice. “We’re here to have a good time.”

  Was this his idea of a good time? Watching random people have sex? She was too afraid to ask, so she lowered her eyes and clutched her drink with such force she was surprised the glass didn’t shatter.

  “Uh-uh, that won’t do.”

  She flinched when his forceful grip captured her chin, yanking her head up.

  “Watch,” he ordered.

  Her heart raced faster. She was out of her element here. She didn’t want to watch. She didn’t want – oh fuck, but she did want to. Or at least her body wanted it. Her skin felt tight and achy, her nipples harder than the icicles that formed on the compound roof every winter. And that deep pulsing in her core. It was getting worse, spiking her body temperature, making her thighs tremble. She was painfully aware of the wetness between her legs, and a shiver flew up her spine as she focused on Rylan.

  His face was buried between the blonde’s breasts, hands stroking up and down her bare back, hips rocking slightly as he rubbed his lips over one puckered nipple.

  “Tell me what you see.” Connor’s rough demand was an echo of the one he’d voiced at the storage station, except it was different this time. He wasn’t asking her to assess security protocols. He was asking her to describe debauchery.

  Hudson’s voice wobbled. “I see sex.”

  Connor laughed. “No, not even close. Not yet anyway.”

  He brought the tumbler to his lips, and Hudson was fascinated by the way his strong, corded throat strained as he drank.

  “Don’t look at me,” he said sharply. “Look at Rylan. Look at her. And tell me what you see.”

  She gulped her tequila. “He’s turning her on.”

  No, he was driving her wild. Rylan’s cheeks hollowed slightly as he sucked the woman’s nipple deep in his mouth, triggering a throaty moan from her lips. Hudson couldn’t see the blonde’s face, but judging by the way she arched her spine and desperately pushed her breast into Rylan’s face, she was clearly enjoying herself.

  “Oh, he’s turning her on, all right,” Connor agreed. “What about you, baby? Is he turning you on?”

  Hudson shifted to find him watching her intently. “W-what?”

  “Do you like seeing him suck on those gorgeous tits?”

  The tension in her body intensified, tightening her muscles and making her heart beat erratically. “No,” she lied.

  Something indecipherable flicked through his eyes. Damn it. She felt like she’d failed another test. That she’d been failing from the second they’d stepped foot in this house. But she didn’t know what he expected from her. What he wanted her to say, what he was hoping she’d do. Did he want her to join the party? Saunter over there and push her breasts into Rylan’s face too? br />
  A hot shiver ran through her. She could do it. The way everyone in this room was carrying on, no one would care if she joined in. They’d probably be all too happy to initiate her into this world of unadulterated sin.

  Except there was one problem. The only man she wanted to be sinful with was sitting right beside her.

  “Keep watching.”

  Hudson hadn’t realized she’d turned away until a tug on her hair brought her gaze back to the couch, where the woman was unzipping Rylan’s pants.